


Wind of change

by HikariYumi



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Connor & Hank Anderson Friendship, Connor Deserves Happiness, Connor still fights his programming, Deviant Connor, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hank Being Awesome, Identity Issues, Post peaceful ending, mention of murder, the world after the revolution, those are takes on my headcanons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-26 01:37:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14989940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HikariYumi/pseuds/HikariYumi
Summary: After the revolution the world is presented with new problems. Androids are killed because of their knowledge and a world war seems around the corner. Everyone seems to grow to fit into the changing times, but Connor struggles.





	Wind of change

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cleopatra93](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cleopatra93/gifts).



> Hello there,
> 
> These are actually just little plot points I’ve thought about lately.  
> It’s nothing big or too complex, I just needed to get this out of my system.
> 
> Thank you for stopping by, I hope you won’t be disappointed. :)
> 
> This work isn’t beta read, sorry for mistakes. ^~^
> 
> ~Hikari 
> 
> P.S. This little thing is dedicated to Bianca, the awesome person I’ve lulled into this fandom because I needed to gush about it. Welcome. Also, thank you for the amazing headcanons we exchange! I love it!

“Connor, relax for a change, seriously.”  
Hank shook his head in mock annoyance as he observed his friend. It was an usual Saturday evening, meaning they were in the man’s favourite bar, watching the that nights game.

Naturally, the barroom was suitably crowded, men as well as a few women were huddled together around the tables closest to the screens. Hank enjoyed the atmosphere it created, the collective solidarity without having to actively engage yourself.

His android friend on the other hand was still having a harder time to relax into the event than the others did. This wasn’t even an android-thing in Hanks opinion, Connor was all around just a lot stiffer than most of his people.   
It was unbelievable for Hank how Cyberlife could attempt to create a prototype to blend in with humans and make it socially awkward. The world didn’t work that way, especially not in a police department.

Well, the kid _had_ managed to grow on him after all, so maybe Cyberlife hadn’t been that wrong.  
No, it wasn’t the programming that had made Hank slowly change his standing, it had been the moments when Connor had rebelled on his own accord.

“I can assure you that I’m quite content, Lieutenant.”  
Quite content his ass, but what could he do? So instead he turned back to the screen and indulged in a drink and his usual sort of entertainment.

~

“Why do you want to go back to the police? You’re free now, aren’t there other things you want to try out? You know you don’t have to return to your position.”  
Actually, Hank was pretty sure that Fowler would be very hesitant to take Connor in again.

The android’s eyes turned unfocused and the handy little LED on his temple dipped yellow.   
Part of Hank was glad that Connor had decided against removing it, this thing helped immensely with trying to understand his closed-off friend, on the other hand that behaviour also worried him. But he didn’t brought it up, if Connor decided that he wanted to keep it, who was Hank to question that?

“I- Lieutenant, there is something I don’t understand.”  
The brown eyes glanced over to him again, his temple kept to glow yellow.  
“What is it?”

“How do others do it, changing their professions? How do they want it?”  
“How do they- Connor that’s not-“  
Hank sighed deeply and rubbed the bridge of his nose. Deciding, that he wasn’t up to having this conversation in the middle of the living room, the man guided his friend to the sofa.  
“Way better.”

The android obediently assumed his usual straight position, while he followed Hank’s movements expectantly.  
“Okay look, that you have to ask this question is pretty much an indicator that you should stay at the police. You can’t force yourself to want something and you really shouldn’t try it.”

Connor frowned, LED yet to return to it’s soothing blue. Hank started to assume that it indicated his friend being upset rather than processing their conversation.  
“But Markus and the rest fought so hard to free us, how can I undermine their efforts like this? Something is wrong with me, I’m not like the others from Jericho.”  
Definitely upset then, he should do something about that. 

Hank hadn’t thought about the whole situation like this before, even though he had noticed how different deviancy treated Connor. The others had been either freed by Markus and the rest or had rebelled on their own following traumatic situations. Not so much Connor.  
The whole time they had worked together, his friend had showed little signs of him turning deviant. He had saved Hank instead of pursuing a culprit, and even let the two Traci’s flee when they’d been at the Eden club. It never seemed to come easy to him, as if every of these actions cost a lot of strength.

And then afterwards Connor took a few steps back again, as if to make a point of him being a good little machine, as if to pretend everything was fine.  
Maybe, it was because his friend had fought deviancy harder than anyone else, the distaste of being disobedient to Cyberlife had been programmed into him. And even now, Connor seemed to be constantly working against the orders he had been given after his activation.

Hank felt bad for his friend who fitted nowhere in. He wasn’t a human, not a controlled android and not even as free as the deviants. Could it be that Connor was lonely sometimes?

“No, you aren’t. But kid, doesn’t being free mean that you can just be how you want to be? Who forces you to change jobs, if that is what you like? I was only asking to make sure that you didn’t stay out of the wrong reasons.”

“You mean because of obedience?”  
The lieutenant nodded, out of the corner of his eye he could see the yellow light blink rapidly.  
“I don’t know what else to do, but I like being useful, I like to help and work with you. That isn't a wrong reason, right?”

Hank forced himself to smile reassuringly at Connor, whose calm and collected demeanour had shifted into uncertainty.  
“No, that’s absolutely okay. Freedom means you’re free to do what you want.”

“Within legal parameters.”   
Connor smiled back, yellow fading back to cool blue.  
“Exactly.”

~

“This is a mess.”  
Hank leaned back into his office chair, feeling a lot like having a drink right now.  
His partner-once-again looked up from the computer screen to face him seriously.  
“It is not right now, but it’s going to be soon.”

Hank raised an eyebrow, spine straightening up in anticipation of bad news.  
“What do you mean?”

Connor’s eyes flickered back to the displayed data, processing and analysing again what he’d just found.  
“All evidence is pointing towards Joan Adams being the murderer of his former android.”  
So far, so clear. It had been rather obvious, even though Adams had tried to erase his traces, Connor had been able to reconstruct the scene anyway. The only thing they’d been missing was the motive.

Yes, human on android brutality was on the rise again a few months after the revolution, but hate crimes presented themselves normally way clearer. This was different.

“I dug through Joan Adams purchase history to determine how long his android had been with him before being freed. Apparently he and his company had been one of the first buyers back in the early days of Cyberlife.   
The detroid branch banks had all staffed their security with the first models and kept upgrading it with the newer versions up to the revolution.   
Joan himself acquired a different model to use it as a bodyguard.”

Hank wasn’t quite sure what Connor deemed so interesting in this, it surely wasn’t too unusual. Businesses had been quicker to include androids than the private households had, pay-only-once workers were a clever investment after all.

“Cyberlife granted him the request to transfer memories and characteristics of this first model to all the following ones he acquired over time, meaning the murdered android might’ve known all of Joan Adam’s secrets regarding the Detroit bank of at least the last years. Security codes, schedules, inner workings and everything else.  
Humans had been proven to have been less cautious with giving away sensible informations to their androids than they would’ve been to other humans. And keeping all those information stored together in one place was convenient.”  
“Until it wasn’t anymore.”

Oh god.   
Humans could see the knowledge androids had required in the years under their care as a threat. Not only the business bosses, but other people as well. Secrets of cheating husbands and neglecting mothers, everything could come to light.  
How many upper middle-class families reputations could be dirtied by that.

It wasn’t important if the androids actually intended to spill something, the possibility alone was enough to already provoke action.

And the maybe worst thing about this situation was that there wasn’t a solution to find. As long as the androids knew the secrets they had been told over the course of their lives, people would be scared.   
Of course people were going to request wiping their former employees memories, but there was no way this would be allowed.  
Maybe further down the line, but right now the little branch of trust that hadn’t even blossomed yet was to fragile for such a procedure.

“We can’t do anything about it.”  
Connor nodded silently, his LED flickering red for a millisecond before returning from yellow to blue.  
“I can understand it.”

Dread settled in Hanks stomach as his friend uttered those words. There was no need for clarification, but Connor delivered it anyway:  
“Secrets need to be protected. Even if we don’t pay any mind to the revolution right now, the world is driving toward a Third World War. We don’t know what informations former android’s s from government representatives hold, one wrong move and the safety of the whole world is in danger.”

“Yeah, sure, but murdering the androids doesn’t do any good. The mood will worsen and soon we’ll have a civil war on top of everything else. Yes, Markus has done everything he could to make this all happen peacefully, but there’s only so much he can control.”  
Connor stayed silent, they were aware that there was no black and white, how much could be sacrificed for peace? And if those sacrifices weren’t even enough to prevent a war, could you even dare to consider it?

“I’m surprised that Cyberlife hasn’t called me in yet” his friend eventually spoke up into the heavy silence between them.  
Hank blinked in bewilderment.  
“Why should they? You’re not working for them anymore.”  
Connor just stared at him until he grasped the meaning behind the words on his own.  
“You also have crucial information about them.”   
It wasn’t a question.

“I am a prototype after all. I might not be aware of anything they could be worried as of now, but they could assume that as deviant I could try to access my coding.”  
Hank was aware that Connor was a state-of-the-art model, intelligent and even more important with an extensive self-diagnosis ability. It had been programmed into him for keeping track of possible software instability and deeper coding problems. Connor could actually turn out to become a threat to them thanks to this.

“Do you think you could figure out how to build biocomponents or even reproduce whole androids?”  
This would be the last step to android independence, ruling out the last bit of power Cyberlife still held over them.  
“Not everything, no, and not me alone either, but I might be able to find clues.”

Connor turned back to the computer, an obvious attempt to hide and divert from the topic at hand. As many intrusive, personal questions his friend posed to others, he rarely talked about himself.

“Don’t worry about it, I won’t let one of those people lay a finger on you. We all have to protect each other, especially our friends and family.”

The simulated breathing visibly stopped for a moment, just like Connor had forgotten to continue it.  
“I am your friend?”  
There was nervousness in the smooth voice, uncertainty.

Hank huffed, remembering all those times they’d worked side by side, how long they’d spent together and how close they had become.  
“No, you are family by now.”

~

Things were calming down eventually.   
There had been more murders, way too many in everyone’s opinion, but the only thing Hank and Connor could do was do the culprits justice. It didn’t feel like it was enough, though.

It was a miracle, but the nation’s leader’s had agreed to meet each other to discuss the state of the world. It was no grant for peace in any case, but it certainly was a step into the right direction.

As for Connor, he still struggled to fit in, but interestingly enough Hank’s admission all those months ago at the department had helped him through the worst of it.  
Apparently, because whoever Connor was or what he wanted to do with his new life, he would always have a place with Hank.  
And that was the most important thing.

The world was spinning and they all just tried to keep up with it.


End file.
